IN BRIEF
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• Seamen working for P&O Ferries at Dover voted at the weekend to continue their strike, now in its fourth week.
• Production of Ford's Transits, Cargos and Escort and Fiesta vans is back to normal this week, after the company's 32,500 manual workers voted to return to work.
• The cause of a crash in which a family of five died when their car was crushed under a 28-tonne truck remains a mystery, a coroner has ruled. Philip Gill recorded verdicts of misadventure on last October's accident when the family's Mini car veered out of control and under the lorry. A police accident investigator, however, said that the lorry driver might have overreacted and braked too hard, trying to stop.
• Ford of Europe's commercial vehicle sales exceeded the company's targets in 1987, in a year when the group increased its profits by 93%. It made $1.07 billion (0.6 billion) — its second best profits ever, and its market share in Europe is now 11.8%.
• A tanker driver who was involved in the M61 pile-up in October in which 13 people died is to be prosecuted next month for causing death by reckless driving. Lancashire police say two specimen summonses have been issued against David Dawson, 24, a driver with Lanstar Petroleum of Manchester, following the accident at Walton-le-Dale. He will appear at South Ribble magistrates court, Leyland on 16 March.
• Commercial vehicle production last month was "encouraging", says the Department of Trade and Industry, at 22,300 units on a seasonally adjusted basis. This was 16% up on the previous six months and 12% ahead of the same point a year ago — 16,200 trucks were built for the UK market during January.